It's not you, it's me

[TRUE STORY: I got home from Anna & Talia's joint birthday party Saturday night at approximately 3am and instead of going straight to bed because I had to be at work in the morning, I stayed up eating instant oatmeal and watching the Chris Rock documentary, Good Hair. Why? Because I make unique and horrible decisions when I'm drunk. (Side note: those unique and horrible decisions used to involve things like, hooking up with strangers and/or general drunk drama. Now they involve fiber-rich breakfast foods and documentaries about African American hair. Meghan McBlogger: this is your life.)

I got home from work tonight and was like, "well, I'll just take a wee, tiny little cat nap and then wake up fresh and rejuvenated and write something. It's now 2:47 in the morning. I fail. Again. AND THEN! I remembered that Tulane Chris sent me two blog posts last week! Yep. No big deal. But he kind of SAVED THE DAY. No Post Monday avoided! And I want to make sweet, gentle love to him on a bed of hot oatmeal for it. Soooo, enjoy that mental picture. Take it away, Chris.]

After my mother, my boyfriend, and the Catholic Church, I am the first to admit my faults. I’m short-tempered, gassy, and lazy. I have combination skin and for the life of me can’t understand economics. I eat practically no vegetables and will sleep with almost anybody. But you know what I’m absolutely the worst at? Dating. Not in a sitcommy, “There are no good guys, I’m 32 and still not married, Chandler and Joey have a duck in the house” wacky way. I’m just bad at it.

Full disclosure: I am amazed that I have a boyfriend. I never wanted one. It seemed like too much trouble. Dating was a way to get laid, pure and simple, so I went into it with a bad attitude, the same way I approach most things. My shortcomings were as follows:

- I am terrible at small talk because I genuinely don’t give a good-God-damn. I can’t talk about my upbringing because I grew up in a boring town with weird people, so I can either talk about my town’s Slovak Heritage Museum or I can talk about my mom’s friend Bev who lived with us and was a topless waitress for the Lord. Both of these are bonershrinkers at best. I can’t talk about music because I simply don’t care about it the way other people do. It doesn’t make any sense to me to use “bands I’ve heard of” as a status symbol, which is why I hate Decemberist fans – they were so busy talking to each other about other bands and so concerned with BEING SEEN AT A DECEMBERISTS SHOW that I couldn’t hear the fucking music. I wanted to make lampshades out of all their fucking ironic Nintendo tattoos. I can’t talk about travel because I’ve been to Israel, New Zealand, and New Caledonia, and no one ever knows what to ask me about those places, so unless someone wants to talk about religious violence and weird birds, I’m still out of luck. I can’t talk about politics because I have weird political beliefs and I can’t stand earnestness. The second someone starts talking about “Getting out the vote” I just leave, because there’s no way I can get it up after that. The only safe topics are really pets and food, and that only gets you so far.

- On some weird inherent level, I don’t understand people who don’t go on dates at least somewhat planning to have sex. Intellectually, I know that some people do it to “meet people” or “have a good time,” but I can’t feel that. So whenever it looks like the evening is not going to end in sex, I get uncomfortable because I cannot fathom what this other guy wants. Does he just want me to buy him dinner? Does he want to “get to know each other” first? That’s a wash, because asking someone you know or, God forbid, respect, to have dirty sex is awful. If some stranger won’t do it, who cares? If someone you like won’t do it, then there’s A Conversation About Feelings and Boundaries.

- I hate having them over to my place, because then they’re in my house, and what if they won’t leave? Going over to His Place is bad too, though, for totally different reasons. SO many people have such DULL apartments. It was especially terrible when I lived in Austin, because there are so many boxy apartment building superstructures that it was like having the same one-night stand reflected over an axis or with different carpet. Also, most gay people have the same fucking wall art. Sarah Bernhart with absinthe in 1900? Wow, never seen that over some dude’s shoulder before. I also hate having sex with people with really tidy apartments, which – again – most gay people seem to have. I was always afraid I’d ejaculate on something that would have to be dry-cleaned.

- There are still people who don’t use condoms. I… what? Granted, I’m going to bed with people I don’t know terribly well, but I don’t want fluids just hither and yon, flowing like the mighty Nile.

- I’m not wild about emotions, so I don’t see the point in dating someone unless you’re completely head-over-heels or need a project to get you through a boring patch. I’ve known so many people who were always having these passionate, dramatic relationships, and it made me tired just to watch. Dating someone you dislike just so you’re not alone is incomprehensible to me – I’m dating someone I love despite preferring to be alone. I don’t understand wanting someone there just so someone’s there. I’d legits rather cut.

- I have night terrors. Not often, but regularly. So occasionally, I’d go home with some guy, Things Would Happen, and then in the middle of the night I start screaming in my sleep. Not like a little cute talk in my sleep, like actually screaming “No, no, no, no, no, no!” while sound asleep. Try talking someone into being friends with benefits after that. I do, however, take comfort in the fact that I turned into the story about The Guy Who Had Night Terrors.

- One guy insisted that we have sex to Linkin Park. VOM.

So, see? I have literally none of the skills required to be a good date except good table manners and being a decent lay. If Giant Camel ever leaves me, I plan to just write my phone number on men’s room walls. It may not be glamorous, but those boys seem to know what they want.

“Knock, knock.”

“Who’s there?”

"Sorr."

“Sorr who?”

“SORR ABOUT THE BAG”